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Festival gets new majority

Mike Swanson

Discussions to license the Pageant of the Masters will likely

disappear for at least a year as a result of this year’s board of

directors election.

The slate of incumbent David Young, Anita Mangels and Carolyn

Reynolds were selected by Festival of Arts members to serve on the

board, meaning five of the nine seats now publicly oppose the idea to

listen to licensing options. The issue caused an uproar among the

arts community throughout this year’s festival.

The announcement of the winners at the 2003 Festival of Arts

annual meeting Wednesday night drew resounding applause from the

crowd of members in the Forum Theater. Young then made an impromptu

announcement after the noise subsided, honoring the festival and

pageant’s volunteers and noting their importance in keeping the event

in Laguna.

“We’ll never be able to move this festival from Laguna Beach,”

Young said. “Where would we get 500 volunteers in any other place but

here?”

Young, Mangels and Reynolds ran away with the election, with each

receiving more than 70% of the votes on 1,377 cast ballots. Young

received 1,115 votes, while Mangels and Reynolds both received 984.

Bruce Rasner, the now-former president of the board, was a distant

fourth with 293 votes.

Artist Randy Bader, an exhibitor at the festival for more than 20

years, was pleased with the outcome and surprised that an incumbent

received so few votes.

“I think the only people that vote with a certain amount of

knowledge are from Laguna Beach, and the others in Orange County tend

to just go with the status quo,” Bader said. “I find it very

interesting that the vote played out like that.”

Bader considered Rasner among the “warriors” who fought to keep

the festival in Laguna Beach four years ago, who he said did their

good deeds for the festival and now ought to move on.

“Warriors aren’t always the best at running things,” Bader said.

“It’s time for them to step aside and give some other people a chance

to see what they can do.”

Rasner wasn’t present at the meeting, having received an

opportunity last week to travel to Papua New Guinea on an underwater

photography assignment. Rasner has exhibited his photography at the

festival for 13 years.

Young, 90 and first elected to the board in 1954, is looking forward to things returning to normalcy on the festival grounds.

“It’s been crazy around here for the last six years,” Young said.

“We’re going to start getting back to the things we ought to be

doing, helping out the city and getting back into a community groove.

I want to stop hearing about all these crazy tangents about licensing

and what not.

“We’re going to try to make it as perfect as we can.”

Of 2,486 members eligible to vote, 55% did, which Chairman of the

Tellers Jim McBride called extraordinary.

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